


Sad Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands

by bjfic_archivist



Category: Queer as Folk (US)
Genre: Angst, Canon, Drama, Episode Related, Gap Filler, Season/Series 04, Songfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-07-28
Updated: 2008-07-28
Packaged: 2018-12-27 05:24:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,927
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12074355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bjfic_archivist/pseuds/bjfic_archivist
Summary: When Justin comes back to Brian's loft after his encounter with Hobbs (405), he and Brian struggle with some old, familiar demons.





	Sad Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands

**Author's Note:**

> Note from IrishCaelan, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [The Brian/Justin Fanfiction Archive](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Brian_Justin_Fanfiction_Archive). To preserve the archive, I began importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in September 2017. I posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [The Brian/Justin Fanfiction Archive collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/bjfic/profile).

  
Author's notes:

This story is a potential snippet of what will probably become a much longer, more-involved story. It's a bit rough around the edges and slightly experimental (for me, anyway), so be gentle. 

The lyrics are from Bob Dylan's "Sad Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands"   


* * *

_Sad-eyed lady of the lowlands,  
Where the sad-eyed prophet says that no man comes_

Justin had already been standing outside of Brian’s loft for half an hour. He knew that he could go in, that he probably should just suck up his pride or his shame or both and go inside, but he couldn’t yet. He hadn’t seen or spoken to or heard from Brian for two days; not since their fight over the gun. 

His mind had been blank since leaving Chris Hobb’s backyard. He wasn’t hearing his own thoughts, just the echo of Chris’s crying and Cody’s shouting, calling him a coward and a faggot. But that didn’t bother Justin as much as he was bothered by his inability to go inside Brian’s apartment. There was nowhere he ever felt safer, but at the moment, it wasn’t the source of asylum that Justin usually found there.

So he stood outside smoking, hoping that Brian would just sense his presence on the other side of the door and come out to get him. Because the fact of the matter was that Justin really needed Brian right now. Pathetic as that was, it wasn’t his neediness that bothered him, that prevented him from going inside; it was his guilt over his behavior two nights ago. He allowed his anger, his frustration, his misery rise to the surface, and he directed it all at Brian. What’s worse, since the bashing, and especially during their fight two nights ago, some part of Justin blamed Brian for those feelings. It wasn’t because Justin thought Brian was responsible for what happened; Justin had never thought that for a moment. He was angry at Brian for never allowing him to deal with what had happened in the way that he needed to. Though Justin had never said it, Brian’s telling him to “move on” and “forget about it” only made things worse, because then he never faced what had happened, and then it was always there. Tearing at his skin, bleeding through his eyes, the pain and the rage and the sorrow were ubiquitous and gnawing; his pain and sorrow were eating him alive.

Finally, after almost an hour of pacing, Justin put his key in the door and walked inside. He saw Brian as soon as he was inside. He was sitting on the bed with papers and notepads and ad copies laid out in front of him. He was still in his work clothes though without shoes or socks, and his tie had been abandoned. His dark grey shirt was unbuttoned and the ends were hanging languidly outside of the waistband of his slacks. He looked tired, worn, worried; but even as disheveled as he was, Justin noticed that Brian still looked expensive.

“Hey,” Justin said weakly, unsure of how Brian might react to him.

“Hey,” Brian said, almost as quietly. “I was hoping I would see you tonight.”

“Yeah?”

Brian gave him a half smile. “Yeah.”

What Justin didn’t know, and Brian would never tell him, was that he had been waiting for him. He knew where Justin was coming from; Daphne had made a trip to his office that afternoon to inform him. He was glad he knew, and now he was just relieved to see Justin coming home to him and that he was all right. Well, at least he looked all right.

“Did you just get back from work?”

“A little while ago.”

“Not all fun and games starting your own business, huh?”

“Nah. And it’s all your fault.”

“What?”

“Well, with a name as good as Kinnetik, I just had to start the company.”

Justin tried to smile at the flattery but failed. So instead, he shrugged. It was then that Brian noticed that Justin hadn’t moved past the island in the kitchen since walking into the loft, and he knew that he was going to have to ask the question that he was afraid to know the answer to.

“Are you all right?”

Looking away as his only response to the question, Justin tried to hold back his tears. The concern in Brian’s voice, the sincerity that he knew Brian saved only for the most special of occasions, struck a nerve in Justin that apparently synapsed directly with his tear ducts. Unable to control the rising swell of sensation of everything that had happened in the past three years, particularly the events of the past few days, Justin let go. He put his face in his hands and, without moving from where he stood, began to cry.

Brian watched Justin fall apart in front of his eyes. It wasn’t the first time, and it wouldn’t be the last, but it was alarming nonetheless. Brian couldn’t remember thinking to go to Justin, but he was walking toward his sad-eyed lover before he even knew his legs were moving. 

When he wrapped his arms around Justin, Brian felt him curl up inside of his embrace, like a child, like something much more delicate than the man that he had become. It was startling for Brian, but he didn’t run away like he knew he would have in the past. He stood quietly, holding Justin as he continued to cry into his hands. 

“What happened?” Brian asked. Against his chest, Brian felt Justin shake his head.

“I’m so fucked up.” 

“No you’re not.”

“I am. I make myself crazy and then it doesn’t change anything. I’m still just crazy and angry and... me.” 

“Justin, if it’s any consolation, I kind of like you. Even if you are crazy and angry.”

Justin chuckled a little. For Brian, this slight release was like oxygen. He squeezed Justin, who was still crying softly, a little tighter and pressed his lips into the soft, stubbly blond hair that he was still getting used to. Justin made his first move and wrapped his arms around Brian’s waist and pressed his face flush against the hollow of Brian’s neck. Brian could feel the moisture of Justin’s tears on his collarbone. But the way he saw it, anything was better than blood. 

Another few minutes went by without either of them saying a word. Brian didn’t want to break the silence again; he wanted to let Justin have the lead. It didn’t take long for Justin to understand Brian’s rare relinquishment of control. Even if it was just control of the conversation, Justin understood what it meant.

“I feel like such an asshole.” 

“Why? What happened?”

“Not about tonight,” Justin said, ignoring what Brian felt was the more important of his two questions. “About how I was acting the other night. You were right to be concerned, to be pissed, to tell me not to carry a gun around. Hell, you were even right to laugh at me.” 

“Whoa,” Brian said, pulling back from Justin but not breaking contact. Holding Justin’s upper arms firmly, affectionately, he demanded eye contact.

“I was never laughing at you.”

“I know, I know,” Justin said, because he did know. He knew that when Brian said there was nothing funny about what had happened, he had meant it with ever fiber of his being.

“Then what?”

“Maybe you should have been laughing at me.”

“I would never laugh at you. Not about this.”

“I feel like such a joke, though, such an idiot. Running around Pittsburgh with a shaved head and a pink shirt looking for... what? Vengeance? Closure? What?”

Brian shrugged with Justin still in his arms. “I can’t answer that.”

“Maybe all I wanted was little peace of mind, to be a little less angry and frustrated and exhausted all the time. But now I’m just more angry, more frustrated, more exhausted. Only with myself, now, more than Hobbs.”

It was the first time since Justin had arrived at the loft that he said his name. Hobbs. The word was like hemlock hanging in the air, and all Brian could think to say was: 

“You can’t change what happened.” 

He pulled back a little so that he could look at Justin as he continued. “No matter how much you... no matter how much I wish that the past could somehow be different, we can’t change anything.”

Justin shook his head a little and Brian found himself agreeing with him. Even he couldn’t believe his own words. Though he knew he wanted, needed to say these things to try to comfort Justin, Brian for the first time in his life couldn’t buy into what he was selling.

“I just want him to know, to really know, how much he hurt me. I want him to feel it.”

“He never will. He’s an inhuman, sociopathic homophobe who will never, ever feel sorry about what he did. But you can’t let that get in your way, because then he’ll own you. He’ll have won. And you’re better than that.”

Justin sighed, the last of his tears escaping from his eyes as he leaned his head forward against Brian’s chest again. “I don’t know if I can do that.”

“You can,” Brian said. Of this he was certain. 

“How can you be so sure?”

“You survived that night, you woke up from a coma, you learned to draw again... you did everything that people thought you couldn’t and I saw it all.”

“But not you,” Justin said, holding Brian’s gaze with his own.

“Not I what?”

“You never thought that I couldn’t do those things?”

Brian shook his head.

“No doubt? Not for a second?”

“Not for a second,” Brian told him.

“And you really think I can get over this? That I can just put this all behind me and move on?”

“I absolutely do.” Brian said this because if Justin didn’t, then how could he?

Nodding very slightly, Justin folded himself back into Brian’s embrace. He allowed himself to be held for a while and said nothing, mostly because he had nothing left to say. He wanted so badly to believe Brian, to find some comfort in the man that he had looked up to and depended on for so long; but for the first time since the night that he me Brian, his word wasn’t enough. For the moment, however, Brian’s affection, his compassion, was sufficient solace to hold him over until his next collapse.

“I love you,” he muttered almost unintelligibly into Brian’s chest. But Brian heard him loud and clear. Those words had become so recognizable to him that he could identify them by the intonation of Justin’s voice. Brian had been hearing these words for over three years, and though they weren’t as frequent as they had been at the beginning of their pseudo relationship, that didn’t make them any less familiar.

Brian, to no one’s surprise, had no verbal response to this. Rather than say anything, he hugged Justin a little tighter and kissed the top of his head. He always responded this way to Justin’s major and minor declarations of love: with physical affection. As much as he would have liked to give Justin anything that he wanted to make him feel better, stronger, less angry, less afraid, Brian (operative word) _couldn’t_ give him what he really _needed_.

_My warehouse eyes, my Arabian drums,_  
Should I leave them by your gate,  
Or, sad-eyed lady, should I wait?


End file.
